Why Penaud was sin-binned for knocking the ball backwards

France’s record try scorer went to ask the referee for an explanation at half-time. The answer fits in one line of the law book.

The incident, in the 33rd minute

Bordeaux-Bègles were trailing Stade Français 5-10. Paris centre Jeremy Ward had broken the Bordeaux defence before being chased down and tackled by Nicolas Depoortere. As Ward tried to get the ball away, Damian Penaud came in at the side of the tackle and knocked the ball back towards his own in-goal.

Jérémy Rozier blew straight away and showed the yellow card. On the spot, he summed up his decision: a side entry at the tackle, after a line break, an offence he described as cynical.

What Penaud thought

The Bordeaux wing believed he was within the law for one specific reason: he had sent the ball backwards, not forwards.

That is the logic of the knock-on. Hitting or touching the ball so that it goes backwards is not a knock-on, and it is a common way of intercepting a pass. But that reasoning does not apply here, because the offence was not about the direction of the ball.

I went to ask for an explanation at half-time because I didn’t know (the law), given that I’d brought the ball back

Damian Penaud | Canal+

What the law says

The tackle is governed by Law 14 of World Rugby’s Laws of the Game. Its section 8 sets out what arriving players must do, and point c leaves no room for doubt: they must arrive at the tackle from the direction of their own goal line before playing the ball. Sanction: penalty.

In other words, it does not matter where the ball goes. What matters is where the player comes from. To play the ball at a tackle, you have to get back onside and arrive from behind, not burst in from the side.

The yellow card comes under a different law, Law 9, on foul play. It forbids deliberately infringing any law of the game and allows the referee to send the offender to the sin bin. That is what Jérémy Rozier concluded: an offence committed to stop an attack in full flow.

The match went on

The sin-binning cost Bordeaux nothing. With 14 men they scored through Hugo Reus in the 37th minute, converted by Maxime Lucu, and went in at half-time 12-10 up.

Penaud came back, got his explanation at the break, and scored in the 72nd minute. Bordeaux-Bègles won 40-10.